County hopes to boost tourism with hotel tax

PETERSBURG — Beginning Aug. 1, guests staying in Menard County’s bed and breakfast inns, lodge and motel rooms will see a 3 percent hotel tax added to their bills, with revenues earmarked to promote tourism and attract more overnight visitors.

Ann Gorman

PETERSBURG — Beginning Aug. 1, guests staying in Menard County’s bed and breakfast inns, lodge and motel rooms will see a 3 percent hotel tax added to their bills, with revenues earmarked to promote tourism and attract more overnight visitors.

The local tax will be collected in addition to a 6 percent hotel tax already imposed by the state.

The Menard County Tourism Council pushed for the tax, which commissioners approved last month.

“We are one of the only counties in central Illinois that doesn’t have a hotel tax in place,” tourism council president Terry Steinhour said. “In order to compete with tourism in surrounding counties, we need additional funding. This was the best way to acquire that funding.”

The city of Springfield imposes a 4 percent hotel tax. According to Dallas Whitford of Springfield’s Budget and Management Office, 75 percent of the amount collected is allocated to the Springfield Convention and Visitors Bureau, with the remainder going to the city’s general fund.

Steinhour said it’s hard to estimate how much money the tax will generate in Menard County, but based on average room occupancy, it could yield $8,000-$12,000 annually.

“We won’t see that this year, because we’re getting a late start,” he said.

The tourism council will submit proposals for spending, which the board will have to approve.

“We want to have control of the funds, to make sure they’re spent equally throughout the community,” County board chairman Merle Kirby said.

Steinhour would like to see some of the money used for a part-time employee — at least during the summer months — at the tourism council’s office at the RiverBank Lodge on Sixth Street in Petersburg. Brochures and other information are available there, but the office isn’t staffed on a regular basis.

The past few years, the board has appropriated $10,000 for tourism. The tourism council also collects membership dues and has sold tourist-related merchandise. Those resources, along with a state grant, have helped pay for Menard County travel guides, as well as radio and television advertisements.

The council employs a part-time director, operates a tourism radio station, 1610 AM, maintains a Web site, www.visitmenardcounty.com, organizes special events and promotes activities and sites in the region.

Last year, 466,000 people visited Lincoln’s New Salem State Historic Site just south of Petersburg. Other local attractions include the Hill Prairie Winery in Oakford; the Long Nine Museum in Athens; and the Edgar Lee Masters Museum and Home, the Menard County Historical Society Museum, Ann Rutledge’s gravesite, Terror on the Square haunted house and numerous antiques and specialty shops in Petersburg.

There also are three golf courses: Country Hills in Greenview, and Shambolee and Illinois National, both in rural Petersburg.

Susan Rodger, proprietor of The Oaks bed and breakfast inn in Petersburg, along with her husband Ken, said business has been good. Last year was the inn’s “best year ever,” and she expects to do as well in 2007.

“July is going to be far and away the best month,” Rodger said. “It’s the height of the season.”

“July is a good month,” agreed Dick Moss, a partner in the RiverBank Lodge.

Moss is in favor of the hotel tax, although he didn’t want it to be over 3 percent. Most people expect to pay an additional room tax, he said.

“I don’t think it’ll drive the average tourist away,” he said.

Like Steinhour, Moss hopes some funds will be used to staff the tourism office part time. There’s also a need for more signage and “all the little things that it takes to attract visitors,” he said.

“We have one of the greatest attributes in the state,” Moss said of New Salem. “Yet we have less money devoted to capitalize on it than even surrounding counties with nominal attractions.”

Rodger opposed the hotel tax. She would have preferred that tourism efforts be supported by a county "sin tax" on alcohol and cigarettes.

“I think you’re taxing the people you’re trying to attract,” she said.

Rodger noted that five businesses — The Oaks, Maple Crest and The Branson House bed and breakfast inns and RiverBank Lodge in Petersburg, and motel-style rooms at The Inn at New Salem/Fast Stop complex south of Petersburg — are helping support tourism for the entire county.

The tourism council plans to highlight the upcoming Labor Day celebration in Greenview, Heritage Days in Athens, Harvest Fest in Petersburg and other events, as well as trips on the Stier Trolley Express, Steinhour said.

And members already are gearing up for the 200th birthday of Abraham Lincoln, to be commemorated nationwide in 2009, Steinhour said.

“I think the additional funding will help increase what we’re able to do,” he said.

“Anything we can do to promote getting people here is a positive thing for the county, the municipalities and the road districts,” Horn said. “They all benefit.”
Reach Ann Gorman through The State Journal-Register at (217) 788-1519.